About Jason Smallheer

Jason Smallheer worked for MBS from 2016 to 2017. His diverse career includes freelance work, broadcast radio and ski resort marketing. He has a passion for sharing ideas, helping businesses grow and professional development. When not expressing himself through writing, he enjoys time with his family and being outside doing anything that can result in scuffed knees and dirty clothes.

Understanding course material options available to your faculty and students is the first step in keeping student costs down, ensuring materials are in their hands when they need them which results in higher student success rates. In an effort to educate and offer clarity about digital offerings, MBS Direct has released another complimentary email course focusing on Open Educational Resources (OER).

Rush season is upon you. Students have a week, or two, before classes start. You want to ensure they have the course materials they need to point them towards success in the classroom, but you don’t need to do it alone.

When Googling “the rising cost of education,” more than 63 million articles are available for our reading pleasure. We don’t have the time to comb through articles and whitepapers trying to determine the socio-economic and political root causes. Regardless, the rising costs of education can be attributed to two factors:

Without proper course materials available on the first day of class the chances of student success are reduced, faculty is unable to teach a course in line with administrative goals, and student and faculty retention become a challenge.

Having adoptions submitted on time is a team process. The staff member in charge of your book list bears the majority of the responsibility, and they are reliant on the cooperation of your school's faculty members to have everything done on time. A single unresponsive faculty member can hold up the entire process — they are often unaware their inaction is creating a problem.

The search for a clear winner in the battle for course material supremacy drags on. During the last 12 months there have been surveys and studies conducted with the goal of determining which direction students are moving in their preference, and like a search for the Loch Ness Monster, the picture is fuzzy.

Yesterday we learned about the 222 million people in the United States carrying smartphones and how more of them are making major purchases from their devices. Of the $160 billion being spent from smartphones in 2017, how easy will it be for students to purchase course materials while they are on the go?

318 million people live in the United States and more than 222 million of them are carrying a smartphone. No longer used for simply making phone calls, the cellular phone is also a personal hub for communication, entertainment and eCommerce. In 2017, US consumers will spend more than $160 billion from their mobile phone. How easy will it be for them to buy course materials from their phone?